DeadsetAce
Supporter
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wallace's game has def. gotten back to form...for much of the season i was so disappointed in him. but he seems have gotten back on track
GEORGETOWN BASKETBALL THREAD- Recap
- Thread in 'Sports & Training' Thread starter Started by allen3xis,
- Start date
wallace's game has def. gotten back to form...for much of the season i was so disappointed in him. but he seems have gotten back on track
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He's playin well now, like last season.
But he's definitely not an NBA player.
But really to no fault of his own....he just doesn't have the god givenz size, strength and athleticism of NBA guards
But he's definitely not an NBA player.
But really to no fault of his own....he just doesn't have the god givenz size, strength and athleticism of NBA guards
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Just got back in from the game....CRAZY atmosphere....them Louisiville fans are straight bammas in every sense of the word. I swear 90% of them look likethey are fresh off of the Maury Povich show.....fat ladies in mario urrita jerseys screaming out "don't hate, congratulate"....
a couple of things...
Chris Wright dressed, but got no PT
Our PG's had a REAL tough time beating the press....I could see that being a huge problem come tourney time. I love what Wallace brings to the table (inthe 1/2 court), but I like Sapp bringing the ball up off the inbounds after a hoop.
Jeremiah "Corey Matthews" Rivers....could be the Eugene Lawrence of G'Town...I don't even have to explain what that means
They have to get Hibbert the ball more often.
Freeman/Summers
all in all, it was great to get the W and send our Seniors out on top for their last game at home. I can't wait for this to be Sapp's team nextyear....dude is a baller plain and simple.
As far as Wallace, I would love to see him get a shot as a UDFA next year as an invitee to a NBA camp. Dude is as steady as they come. If hoops doesn'twork out, he always has Law school to fall back on...
22, 33, 55, & 2.....thanks
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I'm starting to worry about this team, in the tourney close guys like these will no always go your way.
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^ when you win so many close games...we just expect it now.
If every game we have is close, that's fine. I'll take my chances.
To win a game against two teams back to back who pressure and get in passing lanes, is big.
We're not gona see too many teams that defensively are as good on the perimiter as Marquette and Louisville.
...
Pitino Says Georgetown's Been Lucky
Today's Georgetown-Louisville game was great stuff, and you'd have to figure there's a high chance these teams play again next week in New York.Which is why Pitino continuing to go out of his way to get himself posted on some sort of locker room bulletin board seemed odd, if nothing else. Here'swhat he said when asked today how Georgetown keeps winning these last-possession last-minute games (6-0 this season).
"They've been lucky," he said. Then he took a minute, and decided to add some more.
"They won because they were better," he said. "And obviously good teams get luck, but on a goaltending call, on a push out-of-bounds, on aHibbert three, God bless them, they're closer to heaven than we are.
"But tonight they were better. They made the plays down the stretch. It wasn't luck. Those other games were pretty lucky. You've got to just takeyour hat off. Put it this way, if they were going to the race track we'd all be up a lot of money right now."
John Thompson III, any response to Pitino?
"I'll just say this, when he came out of the locker room with the same clothes on, I felt pretty good," Thompson said, referring to Pitino'swhite-suit-dark-suit half-time switch during the teams' last meeting.
"It takes luck," he continued, after everyone stopped laughing. "It takes luck. There's no doubt about that, it takes luck. And at the sametime, that group in there has put themselves in a position to be lucky. We believe in what we're doing and how we're doing it, so when the luck kind ofrolls around, we're there to take it. And so there were a lot of situations where we could have [slipped], this game or other games, we stuck with it, webelieved in each other, we believed in how we were doing things. And so in life, just putting yourself in the position to be lucky is what it's all about.So if you want to call it luck, we'll take it."
And just in case Pitino didn't produce enough gambling overtones, here's what Thompson said about enjoying the win.
"I said this last year, two years ago, we finished this phase but we're still sitting at the table," he said. "Games are still going on,cards are still being played, the dice are still in someone's hands. So we can't build ourselves up and start to feel good right now, we've got tokeep playing."
(PS: Thompson also said that Chris Wright will likely play in the Big East Tournament. What a stroke of good luck for the Hoyas.)
I've always been a Pitino fan...
but not anymore.
JT3, class all the way...
If every game we have is close, that's fine. I'll take my chances.
To win a game against two teams back to back who pressure and get in passing lanes, is big.
We're not gona see too many teams that defensively are as good on the perimiter as Marquette and Louisville.
...
Pitino Says Georgetown's Been Lucky
Today's Georgetown-Louisville game was great stuff, and you'd have to figure there's a high chance these teams play again next week in New York.Which is why Pitino continuing to go out of his way to get himself posted on some sort of locker room bulletin board seemed odd, if nothing else. Here'swhat he said when asked today how Georgetown keeps winning these last-possession last-minute games (6-0 this season).
"They've been lucky," he said. Then he took a minute, and decided to add some more.
"They won because they were better," he said. "And obviously good teams get luck, but on a goaltending call, on a push out-of-bounds, on aHibbert three, God bless them, they're closer to heaven than we are.
"But tonight they were better. They made the plays down the stretch. It wasn't luck. Those other games were pretty lucky. You've got to just takeyour hat off. Put it this way, if they were going to the race track we'd all be up a lot of money right now."
John Thompson III, any response to Pitino?
"I'll just say this, when he came out of the locker room with the same clothes on, I felt pretty good," Thompson said, referring to Pitino'swhite-suit-dark-suit half-time switch during the teams' last meeting.
"It takes luck," he continued, after everyone stopped laughing. "It takes luck. There's no doubt about that, it takes luck. And at the sametime, that group in there has put themselves in a position to be lucky. We believe in what we're doing and how we're doing it, so when the luck kind ofrolls around, we're there to take it. And so there were a lot of situations where we could have [slipped], this game or other games, we stuck with it, webelieved in each other, we believed in how we were doing things. And so in life, just putting yourself in the position to be lucky is what it's all about.So if you want to call it luck, we'll take it."
And just in case Pitino didn't produce enough gambling overtones, here's what Thompson said about enjoying the win.
"I said this last year, two years ago, we finished this phase but we're still sitting at the table," he said. "Games are still going on,cards are still being played, the dice are still in someone's hands. So we can't build ourselves up and start to feel good right now, we've got tokeep playing."
(PS: Thompson also said that Chris Wright will likely play in the Big East Tournament. What a stroke of good luck for the Hoyas.)
I've always been a Pitino fan...
but not anymore.
JT3, class all the way...
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22, 33, 55, & 2.....thanks
(32 also)..
Wright coming back can really add another dimension....breaking the press will be much easier with him out there.
And he really can lock up some guards..back to the Memphis game he stripped Rose clean twice.
He can really be a spark off the bench now.
things are rounding into form, just at the right time
DeadsetAce
Supporter
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while its not completely a good thing...being in close games all the time can payoff come tourney time, especially since we been pulling out W's in most ofthem
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I mean,
We were winning close games last year too...
seems to be magnified this year due to how some ended...
It's not gona hurt that we're doing so...
Look at last year's tournament ; BC, came from behind...Vandy last second shot....UNC came back, won in OT...
We were winning close games last year too...
seems to be magnified this year due to how some ended...
It's not gona hurt that we're doing so...
Look at last year's tournament ; BC, came from behind...Vandy last second shot....UNC came back, won in OT...
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wooooooooooooo thats all i gotta say. jeff greens mom was in the house wearing a "felicia" blinged out belt buckle. ill post pics later.
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fat ladies in mario urrita jerseys screaming out "don't hate, congratulate"..
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We play Thursday at Noon...
Most likely against Cuse
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WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Unprompted, the booming voice in the back of the room launched into a slow, steady tutorial for his son standing at the podium.
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
John Thompson III accomplished something his father never did: back-to-back Big East regular season titles.
"Ask them when they're going to compare you to your peers, not Pete Carril and your father," John Thompson Jr. bellowed. "You'renever going to make a damn dime being compared to ancient people. You need to be compared to your peers, who you've done extremely well against, as opposedto your ancient dad and Pete Carril."
John Thompson III, his Georgetown team's second consecutive Big East regular-season crown sewn up, simply smiled. Long accustomed to living in hisfather's looming shadow, JTIII isn't interested in chasing windmills, holding up the gene pool or living up to other people's standards.
And he no longer has to. By winning back-to-back conference titles, the son accomplished something the Hall of Fame father never did. On a greater scale,the Hoyas' dogfight of a 55-52 victory over Louisville solidified Georgetown once more as a program, not simply a flash-in-the-pan team.
Last year's run to the Final Four might have signaled Georgetown was back from its dark days. This title says the Hoyas are here to stay.
"It's great to see this," said Patrick Ewing, swarmed by fans at halftime as he watched his namesake son play (all the while, an unmolestedSecretary of State Condoleezza Rice chomped on a hot dog behind him). "To see this place sold out -- it was always like that when I played, but to see itlike this now, they've done an unbelievable job here."
Winning the Big East is akin to taking a left from Mike Tyson and a right from Muhammad Ali, followed by a nice uppercut from Bernard Hopkins. The league isnot built for sissies or the faint of heart -- never has been. Until Saturday, no team had gone 2-for-2 in claiming regular-season titles since Connecticut in1997-98 and 1998-99.
As if the reputation of the blue-collar, beastly conference weren't enough, it has bloated to the unwieldy size of 16 teams, tarnishing if not thereputation of individual teams, certainly their attractiveness. Gaudy records are impossible and ugly losses a guarantee.
But if you look at the teams as teams -- not as RPIs and records and flat statistics -- not only is it easy to make a slam-dunk case for six to be in theNCAA Tournament and a decent argument for as many as eight, you also could easily pencil as many as five (Georgetown, Louisville, Notre Dame, Connecticut andMarquette) in to the Sweet 16 bracket without much ridicule.
Rick Pitino, not exactly a fan of the mammoth league size, has flitted in and out of the Big East but could easily serve as league historian. He drops theold-school names, Louie Carnesecca and Rollie Massimino, but lives in the present day and appreciates well how unique and difficult Georgetown'saccomplishment is.
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
It's back to the old days, like when Patrick Ewing was manning the middle at Georgetown.
"It's very impressive," Pitino said. "We came in the league at the wrong time. We came in rebuilding off a Final Four. We had arebuilding job, but the last two years, we've finished as one of the teams at the top. Georgetown's been terrific. It's very tough with this manyteams to do it twice."
The game for the regular-season crown -- only the second time in league history two teams went head-to-head to coronate a champion in the season finale --was sweetly indicative of what the Big East is about.
It was brutal and ugly and beautiful all at once. Shots were harder to come by than Kleenex at a Brett Favre news conference, and the unforced and forcederrors rivaled those of a crummy tennis match. Ten minutes in, the score stood at 10-7. Georgetown had five turnovers, Louisville six. Louisville went 15consecutive possessions in the first half without scoring; not to be outdone, Georgetown all but blew an 11-point second-half lead with three cough-ups onthree trips down the court.
But for people reared in the heyday of the league, there was nothing painful about it. It was exactly right.
"I'm sitting there in the first half, thinking, 'This is old-school Big East basketball," Thompson III said.
That the game came down to an almost perfectly executed play somehow seemed poetic. With the score knotted at 52 after Louisville's Earl Clark hit one of two free throws with 1:12 left, the Hoyas' Jonathan Wallace patiently ran the offense, waiting for a sliver of a window. He found itwhen Terrence Williams failed to roll toward DaJuan Summers sitting in the wings. Wallace fed Summers, David Padgett got out just a second late and Summers swished the 3-pointer right in front ofhis bench.
[h3]Georgetown's been terrific. It's very tough with this many teams to do it twice.
[/h3]
-- Louisville coach Rick Pitino
"I cut through on the initial play; I was on the opposite wing," Summers said. "I came through the baseline to stretch the defense out, butnobody came. So when Jon penetrated or whatever he did, I was set and ready to shoot. That's the only reason I made it, because I was set and ready toshoot."
There is no doubt this Hoyas team isn't perfect. They lost only three conference games, but took one game (Connecticut) when 7-foot-2 Roy Hibbert drained a 3-pointer, another (Villanova) when a whistle 75 feet from the hoopsent Wallace to the line to win it and another (West Virginia) when Patrick Ewing Jr.blocked a shot at the buzzer.
"Let's put it this way: If they were at the race track, we'd all be up a lot of money right now," Pitino quipped.
But Georgetown toted a burden this year it hadn't carried since Thompson Jr. tucked away his white towel. Courtesy of last year's regular-seasoncrown, the tournament title and the Final Four run, the Hoyas once more were the team everyone was chasing.
Yet they still carried the hardware at the end, a grinning Summers lugging a trophy proportionally sized to the girth of the league into the media room.
"It was a different outlook this year; teams prepared for us a little better because they caught on to what our system was trying to do last year, soit called for us to kind of counteract what they did," Walllace said. "We had a couple of ups and downs through the course of the season, but thatmade us better as a team, hopefully."
Really, this is all borderline stunning. When JTIII left the security and success of Princeton, a jump from the Ivy League to the Big East that normallywould seem like a mammoth leap up the success ladder, more than a few people wondered whether he was killing his career. Caught in the shifting landscape ofcollege athletics, where private Catholic schools struggled without the benefit of the almighty BCS football dollar, Georgetown had virtually disappeared fromthe hoops horizon. Hoya Paranoia was a regular on the NIT circuit.
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
Center Roy Hibbert has helped lead the Hoyas to the Sweet 16 and Final Four the last two seasons.
But the thing about JTIII, the thing that maybe even his own father doesn't appreciate, is that he is unafraid to embrace his family's legacywhile simultaneously standing as his own man. He didn't make brash promises of greatness when hired, but in his quiet, unassuming way guaranteedincremental improvement.
It came swifter than anyone could have expected, a Sweet 16 in his second season, a Final Four in his third, but Thompson never wavered from the plan and,two Big East crowns later, still hasn't.
So while Thompson Jr. might have been irked by the run up to the Final Four, with Carril earning as much ink as he did when Princeton upset UCLA and PapaJohn feted and celebrated and poked and prodded, none of it registered with his son.
"I've said this from the first day, the first press conference, it's a process, and I still feel that way," JTIII said. "We'restill at the early stages of that process. We've been fortunate to have some success, but we're at the early stages in terms of where I want tobe."
Asked if maybe he wasn't being a bit greedy, considering all he's accomplished so far, Thompson grinned.
"It's my job to be greedy in that regard. I want to stay greedy as far as that goes."
In the back of the media room, dad smiled.
Dana O'Neil covers college basketball for ESPN.com and can be reached at [email protected].
....
So we either get Nova or Cuse for Thursday...
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
John Thompson III accomplished something his father never did: back-to-back Big East regular season titles.
"Ask them when they're going to compare you to your peers, not Pete Carril and your father," John Thompson Jr. bellowed. "You'renever going to make a damn dime being compared to ancient people. You need to be compared to your peers, who you've done extremely well against, as opposedto your ancient dad and Pete Carril."
John Thompson III, his Georgetown team's second consecutive Big East regular-season crown sewn up, simply smiled. Long accustomed to living in hisfather's looming shadow, JTIII isn't interested in chasing windmills, holding up the gene pool or living up to other people's standards.
And he no longer has to. By winning back-to-back conference titles, the son accomplished something the Hall of Fame father never did. On a greater scale,the Hoyas' dogfight of a 55-52 victory over Louisville solidified Georgetown once more as a program, not simply a flash-in-the-pan team.
Last year's run to the Final Four might have signaled Georgetown was back from its dark days. This title says the Hoyas are here to stay.
"It's great to see this," said Patrick Ewing, swarmed by fans at halftime as he watched his namesake son play (all the while, an unmolestedSecretary of State Condoleezza Rice chomped on a hot dog behind him). "To see this place sold out -- it was always like that when I played, but to see itlike this now, they've done an unbelievable job here."
Winning the Big East is akin to taking a left from Mike Tyson and a right from Muhammad Ali, followed by a nice uppercut from Bernard Hopkins. The league isnot built for sissies or the faint of heart -- never has been. Until Saturday, no team had gone 2-for-2 in claiming regular-season titles since Connecticut in1997-98 and 1998-99.
As if the reputation of the blue-collar, beastly conference weren't enough, it has bloated to the unwieldy size of 16 teams, tarnishing if not thereputation of individual teams, certainly their attractiveness. Gaudy records are impossible and ugly losses a guarantee.
But if you look at the teams as teams -- not as RPIs and records and flat statistics -- not only is it easy to make a slam-dunk case for six to be in theNCAA Tournament and a decent argument for as many as eight, you also could easily pencil as many as five (Georgetown, Louisville, Notre Dame, Connecticut andMarquette) in to the Sweet 16 bracket without much ridicule.
Rick Pitino, not exactly a fan of the mammoth league size, has flitted in and out of the Big East but could easily serve as league historian. He drops theold-school names, Louie Carnesecca and Rollie Massimino, but lives in the present day and appreciates well how unique and difficult Georgetown'saccomplishment is.
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
It's back to the old days, like when Patrick Ewing was manning the middle at Georgetown.
"It's very impressive," Pitino said. "We came in the league at the wrong time. We came in rebuilding off a Final Four. We had arebuilding job, but the last two years, we've finished as one of the teams at the top. Georgetown's been terrific. It's very tough with this manyteams to do it twice."
The game for the regular-season crown -- only the second time in league history two teams went head-to-head to coronate a champion in the season finale --was sweetly indicative of what the Big East is about.
It was brutal and ugly and beautiful all at once. Shots were harder to come by than Kleenex at a Brett Favre news conference, and the unforced and forcederrors rivaled those of a crummy tennis match. Ten minutes in, the score stood at 10-7. Georgetown had five turnovers, Louisville six. Louisville went 15consecutive possessions in the first half without scoring; not to be outdone, Georgetown all but blew an 11-point second-half lead with three cough-ups onthree trips down the court.
But for people reared in the heyday of the league, there was nothing painful about it. It was exactly right.
"I'm sitting there in the first half, thinking, 'This is old-school Big East basketball," Thompson III said.
That the game came down to an almost perfectly executed play somehow seemed poetic. With the score knotted at 52 after Louisville's Earl Clark hit one of two free throws with 1:12 left, the Hoyas' Jonathan Wallace patiently ran the offense, waiting for a sliver of a window. He found itwhen Terrence Williams failed to roll toward DaJuan Summers sitting in the wings. Wallace fed Summers, David Padgett got out just a second late and Summers swished the 3-pointer right in front ofhis bench.
-- Louisville coach Rick Pitino
"I cut through on the initial play; I was on the opposite wing," Summers said. "I came through the baseline to stretch the defense out, butnobody came. So when Jon penetrated or whatever he did, I was set and ready to shoot. That's the only reason I made it, because I was set and ready toshoot."
There is no doubt this Hoyas team isn't perfect. They lost only three conference games, but took one game (Connecticut) when 7-foot-2 Roy Hibbert drained a 3-pointer, another (Villanova) when a whistle 75 feet from the hoopsent Wallace to the line to win it and another (West Virginia) when Patrick Ewing Jr.blocked a shot at the buzzer.
"Let's put it this way: If they were at the race track, we'd all be up a lot of money right now," Pitino quipped.
But Georgetown toted a burden this year it hadn't carried since Thompson Jr. tucked away his white towel. Courtesy of last year's regular-seasoncrown, the tournament title and the Final Four run, the Hoyas once more were the team everyone was chasing.
Yet they still carried the hardware at the end, a grinning Summers lugging a trophy proportionally sized to the girth of the league into the media room.
"It was a different outlook this year; teams prepared for us a little better because they caught on to what our system was trying to do last year, soit called for us to kind of counteract what they did," Walllace said. "We had a couple of ups and downs through the course of the season, but thatmade us better as a team, hopefully."
Really, this is all borderline stunning. When JTIII left the security and success of Princeton, a jump from the Ivy League to the Big East that normallywould seem like a mammoth leap up the success ladder, more than a few people wondered whether he was killing his career. Caught in the shifting landscape ofcollege athletics, where private Catholic schools struggled without the benefit of the almighty BCS football dollar, Georgetown had virtually disappeared fromthe hoops horizon. Hoya Paranoia was a regular on the NIT circuit.
[+] Enlarge
AP Photo/Nick Wass
Center Roy Hibbert has helped lead the Hoyas to the Sweet 16 and Final Four the last two seasons.
But the thing about JTIII, the thing that maybe even his own father doesn't appreciate, is that he is unafraid to embrace his family's legacywhile simultaneously standing as his own man. He didn't make brash promises of greatness when hired, but in his quiet, unassuming way guaranteedincremental improvement.
It came swifter than anyone could have expected, a Sweet 16 in his second season, a Final Four in his third, but Thompson never wavered from the plan and,two Big East crowns later, still hasn't.
So while Thompson Jr. might have been irked by the run up to the Final Four, with Carril earning as much ink as he did when Princeton upset UCLA and PapaJohn feted and celebrated and poked and prodded, none of it registered with his son.
"I've said this from the first day, the first press conference, it's a process, and I still feel that way," JTIII said. "We'restill at the early stages of that process. We've been fortunate to have some success, but we're at the early stages in terms of where I want tobe."
Asked if maybe he wasn't being a bit greedy, considering all he's accomplished so far, Thompson grinned.
"It's my job to be greedy in that regard. I want to stay greedy as far as that goes."
In the back of the media room, dad smiled.
Dana O'Neil covers college basketball for ESPN.com and can be reached at [email protected].
....
So we either get Nova or Cuse for Thursday...
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Quick question I forgot to ask about yesterday's game, where did those new unis come from? Were they just for Senior day? I hope they wear those for thetourneys, those joints were
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Ya they'll be worn for the rest of the season
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OH.MY.GOD.
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This is the PERFECT time for CW to come back. I love the intangibles that Jonathan Wallace brings to the table, but I nervous as hell with him trying to bringthe ball up when teams got the full court press going or also if they are trying to trap. Don't even get me started on Corey Matthews. Wright has the speedto get the ball up court, and then let Wallace take it from there....
Allen, what do you think about the Chris Wright/Jessie Sapp/Austin Freeman backcourt for next season? I REALLY think Corey Matthews' minutes are going tobe drastically cut. Freeman (like Jeff Green) could be averaging more points, but he plays SO well within the system that IMO he has been vastly overlooked asfar as being one of the BEST freshmen in the country.
Allen, what do you think about the Chris Wright/Jessie Sapp/Austin Freeman backcourt for next season? I REALLY think Corey Matthews' minutes are going tobe drastically cut. Freeman (like Jeff Green) could be averaging more points, but he plays SO well within the system that IMO he has been vastly overlooked asfar as being one of the BEST freshmen in the country.
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DeadsetAce
Supporter
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i really havent seen wright play at all...only because games for me werent on tv until BE play started. im looking forward to seeing more of him and hopefullya little less of rivers...
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If his foot holds up throughout his career...he is special. Most talented on the ball guard since AI.
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Nova it is...
if we hit from the perimeter we coast. Wright will use his collapsing Roy Hibbert defense as always
if we hit from the perimeter we coast. Wright will use his collapsing Roy Hibbert defense as always
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I want WVU, for the 'goaltending' call. Just like the Nova game today.
We get Uconn, that's fine too
We get Uconn, that's fine too
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time to show them it wasnt a fluke
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Great win
Rivers lost me tonight...that 3 that hit the side of the backboard
Chris Wright is going to be incredible, he already has been a difference maker.
Rivers lost me tonight...that 3 that hit the side of the backboard
Chris Wright is going to be incredible, he already has been a difference maker.
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Thankfully we can't play Pitt now for a while.
Got to be tougher than that.
Hoping we hold onto a #2 seed...I'd welcome that in the East. Which is what I think might happen
Got to be tougher than that.
Hoping we hold onto a #2 seed...I'd welcome that in the East. Which is what I think might happen
